The European Enlightenment, which for the sake of convenience I take to extend from the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 (or very arguably the Peace of Augsburg in 1555) down to the advent of post-modernist ideology sometime in the middle 1960s, remains the basis of the current socio-political order, not only in Europe, but in all nations that trace their cultural, social, ideological, and political DNA back to 16th- and 17th-century Europe, i.e., virtually all the First World and all the former colonies / dependencies thereof (e.g., Australia, India, et al.). In particular, and much closer to home, the American Constitution would be utterly inconceivable without the Enlightenment, especially as it was expressed in Great Britain and Scotland. This has been so true for so long that we have...

One of the more bitter ironies of this already-bitter political season is that many – I won’t say “all,” though I am sorely tempted – progressives / leftists are mirroring Donald J. Trump by, like Trump, seeing things that are not there. With Trump, the illusion concerns the inaugural multitudes that were not there, the millions of illegal voters that were not there, the JFK-assassination conspiracy that was not there, and related delusions. With progressives, the corresponding delusion concerns what they consider the overwhelming likelihood that Donald Trump will be removed from office, either by impeachment or resignation. The two latest examples are Paul Krugman’s recent New York Times column predicting that Trump’s attempt to emasculate Obamacare will undermine Trump’s support among ...

This "Skeptic's Collection" column was originally published on 9 June 2016. I am re-publishing it here because tomorrow is Inauguration Day for Donald J. Trump, a day that I believe Americans will remember as equivalent to the day, 30 January 1933, President Paul von Hindenburg named Adolf Hitler Reichskanzler ("Reich Chancellor") of Germany, and with consequences that will eventually prove as dire for the United States as the previous designation was for the Weimar Republic. This "Skeptic's" column will not change any minds. Probably almost no one will read it. But for those of you who do happen to read it, especially those of you latter-day Esaus who sold the birthright of this Nation as a constitutional republic for the miserable bowl of soup of some imagined economic benefit -- f...